A Cacophony Of Silence
by Miss Meggie
Summary: Tim's world is a contradictory place, and it turned him from a boy who believed in magic and fairness into a man who's not sure any of it even exsisted. Fleur 27's baby gift. Spoilers for all of the seasons Tulie Fic!


**AN: I own nothing this is just for fun. This is Fleur's baby gift I hope you like it. Please review. Thank you to Celtic_Flica for the great beta! All mistakes are mine! Enjoy**

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Tim likes silence and this is one place he knows he won't get any. His cell door clangs when it moves, It grates on his nerves, but nothing at all can pierce through the cacophony of noise surrounding him: the belligerent inmates shouting obscenities at the female officers, the fights that never seemed to end. Not even a little peace can seep through. One good thing was that his cell mate wasn't bothersome a skinny, red –headed, bookish kid. Tim thought he was a mute until Tim asked him how'd gotten here.

"Burned down my girlfriend's house, She wouldn't give me custody of the cat in our break up." The kid went back to his book on astro –physics and Tim started sleeping with one eye open. After all, you can't account for crazy.

He lies on his bunk made of concrete covered with a blue gym mat and a thin scratchy white sheet, and falls back into the time when he loved noise, sounds of all kinds, back when he made noise. Back when it was allowed.

_He wailed at the injustice of it all. "Give it back Billy!" His five__-year__-old body shook__with anger and his sobs._

"_Quit bein' a whiny little butthead, Tim." He tossed the Nerf football and caught it, teasing Tim meanly._

"_William, you be nice to your baby brother." His mother appeared in the doorway to their house._

"_But mama, he's annoying…" _

_Her hazel green eyes softened, a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. _

"_You might not think so now, baby, but one day you'll be grateful to have him__,__. Wanna help me bake some cookies, Timmy?"_

"_Yeah! Cookies are better than football anyway."_

As Tim drifted off to sleep, he remembered the scent and feel of her. Lavender soap and the softness of her hugs and the lazy drawl her voice when she called him Timothy.

-/-

He got into a fight when someone questioned his sexual orientation.

So now he's in solitary. The quiet is finally back… in the ominous way the silence enveloped his house when she got sick. He was seven.

_She doesn't cry when she tells them. Even forces her best reassuring smile. "Boys, I have cancer…but it's ok, I'll do everything the doctor says and it will all be fine."_

_Billy is shaking__,__ Tim thinks maybe he's scared. Daddy just stares at the wall. Then Tim has a wild thought. _

"_They won't shoot you, will they? Jay's dog got cancer and Mr. Street shot him. I thought it was awful mean."_

"_No dumb ass, she'll just die," Billy spits out._

"_William Andrew Riggins! I will not die. You apologize to your brother. He doesn't understand." _

"_Sorry, Buttface. She'll just do chemo."_

_He and Billy find her when she finally does cry, Daddy's gone to Smitty's and Mama's lying on the bathroom floor__.__H__er cheek pressed to the tile, breath shuddering in and out as she fights the dry heaves. Billy moves into the room. _

"_Okay, Mama?" he asks, rubbing her back and tightening the scarf on her head._

"_Yeah." She sits up, leaning on the toilet._

_Tim picks up the snow globe she carries with her and presses it into her palm. "Mama, why do you carry this ?"_

_She smiles at him and despite the gauntness of her face, the frail way the faux silk night__gown hangs off her frame and her used-__to-__be-__sparkly gaze now glazed with sickness , with that smile, he knows his mama is still in there._

"_Because, Tim, it takes me back to when magic was real __and all things were possible." __She holds it up and looks into the globe containing a snow__-covered "Welcome to Texas" sign._

"_Mrs. Street says all things are possible with God."_

_She smiles kinda sad and Tim's not sure what it means__,__. He just knows he doesn't like the way it makes him feel._

"_She's right,__.__" she says simply. She hands Tim the globe. "__You keep that, __O__kay? You__'__r__e__ Daddy gave it to me…bought it in the Dallas airport as my wedding gift."_

"_You're dying." Billy states it so flatly that Tim knows he's serious this time. He wants to punch him for saying it out loud even though they already know it._

"_Probably. Most likely. Yes." Tears fill her eyes and drip down her face. Tim can barely see her for the tears in his own eyes. It's a bit like looking into fun house mirror, only sadder._

"_I didn't mean to make you cry, Mama." He sounds small and childlike to Tim's ears. It scares Tim because Billy's tough and never cries and now his face is all wobbly and red and he's breathing funny from trying not to cry. Tim puts his arm around him but doesn't really hug him because Billy doesn't like mushy shit._

"_I'm crying for you two, not for me."_

"_Why?"_

"_Because of what I am leaving you with."_

"_Why do you have to die?" Tim clarifies, Billy sniffling next to him._

"_I wish I had that answer for you, baby, but I don't."_

_She died on a Monday. Tim always thought it was weird that Forrest Gump remembered the weekday and not the date when Jenny and his Mama die, but __H__e gets it now, because that Monday will live as if it breathes, somewhere in his head forever. He's eight as he watches them lower his very favorite person into the ground__,__ He wants to be five again when cookies were better than football and the only person who will ever truly understand him still had a beating heart._

_It's like sound dies with her. Daddy wants them to be quiet and mostly they are. When __H__e starts throwing her things away and burning her clothes in the oil barrel where he usually keeps all the rattle snakes he catches, __Tim loses it, screaming incoherently, a jumble of thoughts and words. He strikes out,__hitting and kicking whatever part of him he can reach. Just because the drunk asshole hates her for dying doesn't mean the rest of them have to too._

_Walt whirls on him and he know he's in trouble, but doesn't stop to think as he snatches up the snow globe and an old panther's tee shirt from his pile and runs._

_He takes the beating to end all beating and l__o__oses the shirt that smells of lavender, White Shoulders, and Mama, but Billy manages to hide the globe for him so he thinks of it as mostly a victory._

Something died him that night. All his soft places had begun the hardening process. He'd begun to wear the silence that shrouded their house like a coat of armor. It was easier to be himself all by himself. People thought he was broody and anti-social if it didn't involve sex and beer, that is but really, all he's doing is minding his old man and being quiet. 'Besides, he doesn't have much use for words anyway.

-/-

He spends two and half years of his life with the Texas Department Of Corrections and Justice.

Billy meets him, truck, Skeeter, Mindy, and babies in tow, enveloping him in hug so tight Tim can barely breathe.

A few days at home and he slowly begins to realize its very loud and chaotic. He smiles, thinking of his mother and how the house finally sounds like a home. Stevie stands in front of him where he lies sprawled on the couch trying to watch the game.

"Kissa sleepin', " he tells Tim, looking very solemn. "Gotsa play da' quiet game."

Tim smiles yet again this time a little wider. Krista, or Kissa as Stevie calls her, is his six month-old niece. "I know do you like Krista?"

"Kinda."

Tim laughs and lifts him on to the couch with him.

"You were blockin' the game, little dude. Stevie snuggles into Tim. Tim inhales. "Why do you smell like Play doh?"

"I eated some."

-/-

Even though Tim was glad to be home and to be working his way back into a normal life, He felt a little disconnected from life. He was hoping dinner with the Taylor's was just what the doctor ordered.

Billy had spilled the beans to Coach that Tim had taken the rap, and Coach has promptly come to visit him. …That didn't surprize him, but the fact that Julie was in tow had. She taken an intensely awkward silence between him and Coach and turned it into a lively coversation.

And she'd kept coming back, with Coach and on her own. When she moved to New York City to attend Columbia University, he was proud, but selfishly sad for himself. He'd enjoyed her visits how she'd keep thing light sometimes or could make the whole world drop away with the seriousness of their conversation.

He had grown attached to her. Taylor was a good friend, and despite being at college, she'd kept up with writing and even calling. He smiled thinking of the time she told him that her roommate asked her if she was one of those weird women who married lifers.

He turned into the Taylor's' drive. Parking, he gets out, making his way to the door. He knocks and Tami Taylor fills his vision.

"Well, Hi there, Tim." She leans forward, hugging him, her hand rubbing between his shoulder blades in that Mom-ish way of hers. Tim realizes in that moment that part of his disconnect was that people we're no longer kind to him just disdainfully tolerant. He missed kindness, especially Tami Taylor's simple and generous ways of giving it.

She moves aside to let him in. "Tim's here, Honey," She calls out to Coach.

His head pokes out from the kitchen. "Hey Tim, You ready for chili night?"

Tim smiles as Coach treats him as if nothing at all had changed.

"Yes, Sir."

He hears Julie exit her room and sees her five minutes later with Gracie trailing her. Julie walked over, giving him a one- armed hug, her hand running down his back as he loops an arm around her shoulder. He thinks she even hugs like her Mama but won't say it because he knows sometimes Julie's similarities to her mother irk her.

"Hi, Tim!" Gracie greets him.

"You remember me?" he asks.

"Yeah, you're Pretty Hair Guy." They all laugh at that.

They had dinner, talking of town gossip, football, and Julie's college, Gracie tells them she wants to an "Evil ladybug" for Halloween., Never mind that they all wonder what the requirements are to make a lady bug evil or that Halloween is four months away.

He feels himself start to relax as laughter fills the room. Julie is smiling at him and it's genuine, not fakely sweet like Lyla's when he makes some crass joke she pretends she doesn't really gets or the way Tyra's is all sharp like broken glass when she's trying to lie to someone. He likes Julie's smile it's bright and takes up her whole face and he sees innocence in it, like the one she gave him when he realized he'd picked wrong in Powder Puff. He just plain likes the girl.

-/-

They are walking down Milberry Street. "So how's life on the outside?" she asks and he laughs.

"You need to quit watchin' those OZ reruns."

"Ha ha. Seriously, answer me. How is…everything?"

He feels her hand slip easily into his. He holds up their joined hands, pinning her with what he hopes he is a questioning look. She shrugs, eyes never wavering from his.

"I knew you wouldn't."

He nods and drops their hands, keeping them joined.

"How is it? It's different in a lot of ways,. I…uh…well, for one thing, there's Mister Bubble sitting on the edge of the tub now and all of Mindy's girly shit covers the sink, the kids are so damn loud but that's why I did it, I guess, so that part is really nice if not a little weird to get used too."

"But-" Julie pressed on.

"You're like a pit bull, you know?" he smirks, giving her a sidelong glance.

"I'm sorry, forget I-"

"No, don't be sorry, Jules, I've always liked that about you. The honesty and calling people on their shit… anyway, I feel like…." He stops in the street in front of Mrs. Ccalloway's ugly pink mail box and looks at her. "It's going to sound stupid and cheesy."

"I don't care. Tell me any way. I promise I won't laugh."

"I used to think when I was little that this town was magic, and now all that's gone…"

"What made it magical?"

"My mom,. She loved it here. I used to feel her here. On the field, I knew where ever she was, she was watching. Or just driving around aimlessly on the quarry roads or standing there on the edge of that cliff with nothing below me, it was like sometimes she was close enough to touch. And now I just feel like all the judging people did of me behind closed doors and in whispers is open and righteous now. No one wants their cars fixed by someone they think will strip their cars for shits and giggles."

She nods, chewing on her lower lip.

"Once there is something juicer to talk about, they'll move on, Tell me about your mother." The light pressure of her squeezing his hand reassuringly makes him want to tell her things he's never told a single soul not even Jay.

Like the fact that she made strawberry pancakes on Saturday mornings as he watched the Flintstones and the Smurfs, the way she taught him to whistle real shrill like without using his fingers, the way her lipstick felt different on his cheek when she kissed him and it was all dried and half worn off , the way her laugh was so loud it took up the whole room, or the roses on her casket being so pink and lively it had pissed him off, because Mama's favorite color was panther blue but Mrs. Street had picked the flowers- but he doesn't say any of it . He just squeezes her hand, pulling her along on their way .

"Her name was Hannah,. She died of ovarian cancer the week after I turned eight."

He has a brief flash of his eighth birthday cake with no candles because they couldn't have open flames near the oxygen tank. Julie doesn't look like she'll cry. She just looks unsteady a second and says, "Did you know Hannah means 'favored grace' in Hebrew.?"

He finds himself smiling. "No I didn't. It fits." They are strolling along again.

"Yeah, I learned it in a Bible study my mom dragged me to. I've always liked the name so it stuck in my head. Kinda like pie is three point one four, or the first bits of 'How do I love thee'…"

"Which would be?" he asks, just to hear the rhythm of the way she speaks. He can smell mesquite burning in a pit somewhere on one of these streets,. And for a split second, he's back at that trash barrel screaming his head off.

"'How do I love thee, let me count the ways. I love thee to the depth and the breadth and the height my soul can reach, when feeling out of sight, for the ends of Being and ideal Grace.'"

The word "pretty." rumbles out of him and he's not sure if he means her or the poem. Before he can think too much, he reaches out, tilting her face, and plants a soft kiss on her mouth that is just firm enough to tell her without telling her that he meant to do that and will being doing so again in the future. He's proud of himself it's sweet and very nearly chaste. Perfect. Just the way he wanted it. And he doesn't get a lot of perfection in life.

She exhales shakily when they part.

"Because I knew you wouldn't." And he smirks.

-/-

They are dating before he even realizes it and he's happy, they were the talk of the town for the first three months. Somehow being with Julie makes perfect sense to him and he's not sure he deserves her or the trust given to by Coach and Tami but he'll take it none the less. The first time Lyla sees them together well, he got the impression she wanted to set him a flame, but not even Lyla can dampen his happiness.

-/-

In his post- coital haze, he lays in the truck bed on a sleeping bag that smells of cedar from being packed away in Julie's hope chest. Actually he's laying on an N'sync sleeping bag and fights the urge to chuckle when he think of just exactly where Justin Timberlake's face is. He flinches when he feels Julie pop a zit on his shoulder. "Ow!"

"Sorry it was bugging me." She kisses his shoulder just above the blemish.

He smiles, "S'okay." One of the things he really loves about Julie is that she fixes what she can but doesn't push him to change. He thinks of Lyla in that moment, which is funny because he's never brought here. Just Tyra, when he thought it would make their relationship peaceful. He looks over at Julie wrapped in cheap, purple, dollar- store blanket, hair laying on her bare shoulders, laying like a piece of art with the sunset as her canvas.

"I like you're quiet place, Timmy."

He loves her in that moment more than he's ever loved anyone or anything but can't bring himself to say it, to possibly break the bubble.

"Yeah, after where I've been, it's hard to get used too."

"I bet."

"When my Mom died, my dad wanted us to all be quiet-like if we were quiet enough he'd wake up from the nightmare. He loved her as much as he'll ever love anyone. I guess… and none of us ever woke up from the dream."

"And you're still being quiet because?"

"I grew to like it. Simpler than trying to make people understand me."

"I understand you perfectly."

"Yes, and you are the only person alive who does."

She runs a lock of his hair between her middle and index finger before tucking it behind his ear.

"What did she look like?"

"Me. Dad got shit- faced one night and burned every picture and all of her things. Said he didn't need them When he had to live looking at her ghost. I have that snow globe that sits on my tool cart and Billy has her locket and that's it." He briefly thinks of when he went back for the snow globe the way Becky's mom plopped it in his hands saying Becks was taking summer classes at UT and to stay away from her.

"So I was thinking of taking some carpentry classes at Dillon Tech, I built all of Jay's ramps and liked flipping Buddy's house but I don't know… What do you think?" he says, smoothly changing the subject.

"Riggins Construction certainly has a ring to it."

-/-

Tami comes home to find Julie painting Gracie's room, angrily striping lime green on to the wall.. She leans on the door frame.

"Somethin' wrong, baby?"

"You mean other than the fact this color will scar all our retinas permanently.? No. Letting Grace choose her own color may not have been smart." She reloads the roller and swipes swipes swipes swipes.

"Jules,…" Julie whirls around and drops the roller, narrowly missing where the carpet meets drop cloth.

"Walt Riggins is a heartless fucking asshole! Okay?"

"Whoa What? And watch your mouth ." "Do you know that in a drunken fit of rage, he burned everything of his wife's clothes, pictures, letters? Tim and Billy's mother is gone and all they have to say she ever existed is a snow globe, locket, and headstone."

Tami's eyes filled with tears. She walked back down the hall, Julie following behind her somewhat puzzled.

"Mom?"

Tami wordlessly reached into the closet, grabbing a red wing boot box.

"She was my friend, my Tyra." Somehow they came to be sitting Indian- style, facing each other in the narrow hall way, When she opened the box. Julie was greeted with pressed flowers, love letters from her dad (if the yellowed handwriting was any indication), and an old homecoming mum bearing Moe McAarnold's name.

Tami handed Julie a bundle of photographs and then a handful of letters. "Tell Tim he can keep whatever he likes, I'd given it all to him sooner had I known. Walt didn't care for me so I tried not to push."

"Why didn't you say, Mom?" Julie untied what appeared to be a hair ribbon grouping the pictures.'

"Some things, well, they 're just private. And Hannah dying….all the other stuff, not being able to fix or help anything, was just that private,." Tami said, her voice thick as she tried to keep the tears unshed and dabbed at eyes every so often to maintain her make up.

Julie flipped through the photos, stopping on one of two girls with eighties hair and smiles on their faces, sitting on a truck tailgate in front of the Alamo Freeze. Julie didn't know what startled her more how much she looked like her mother or how much her guy looked like his.

And it hit her: Tim was her guy. When the hell did that happen? She quickly decided on some misdirection before her mom saw too much on her face. Tim always said she had a terrible poker face and she'd lost her shirt literally once and was willing to concede his point. Great even her thoughts were rambling now.

"How did you become friends?" She asked.

"She was my chemistry tutor, I was the wild one for a while and then I met your Daddy and things changed for me and then Walt happened. Hannah was very shy and came from a real strict and religious family and Walt swept in the older charming guy who would sneak us into the country club to eat at the restaurant and swim in the pool while he was working as a golf pro…Hannah never stood a chance." Tami smiled sadly . "He conned all of us, not just Hannah."

"What happened?"

"I went off to college. She got married, and it was all okay for a while too. Then I came home for Christmas my sophomore year and I could make out his hand print around her arm,. I was so happy to be engaged and that was like a bucket of cold water being dumped on me. But She wouldn't leave. She was pregnant with Billy."

"We kept up with each other as best we could by the time Tim came along you're father and I were working at this tiny school in Adrian with this little six man team, I didn't get home much and truth be told, it was easier to avoid Hannah than see her like that."

"And then she got sick?" Julie asked tentatively.

"She did."

"Sometimes I wonder who Tim would be if she lived or maybe if he'd just had someone love him properly…I..."

"You what, baby?"

"I love him. A lot." She picked at her nail polish.

"I thought so. It'll be okay, Jules, people will-"

"Oh no, Mom, I couldn't care less what people think." Her eyes snapped up to Tami's.

"I just feel like he's not sure of anything or anyone anymore. Like he can't be who he used to be and he doesn't want to be who people think he is now. He thinks people are out to get him and judge him. Before he wouldn't have cared and I know he doesn't regret it, but I think feeling like all those people were right in their opinions bothers him more than he thought it would. I just want him to know I love him but I don't think he'll believe it. He's in this weird place and I don't know how to help."

"One thing I've learned about Tim is you can push but he does better if you let him find his own way. Tell him you love him because its probably been a long time someone's said it too him and meant it, . Other than that, just do what you're doing. Be there."

-/-

Tim knocking on her car window knocks her out of the reverie she's in. He opens the car door to get in and escape the light summer drizzle that's falling, and sees the boot box lying in the passenger seat. "You bought me boots?"

"No, just look inside. Did you know our moms were friends?." He looks over, trying to figure out what the puzzle on her face means. Shifting the box into his lap, he opens it gingerly and feels as though he 's breaking some kind of rule by looking into the box. Then his eyes fell on the photos of her and it was like all the air was sucked out of the already too tiny car. Tears fill his eyes and he feels the backs of Julie's fingers brushing his cheek as she whispers. , "Keep whatever you like, Tim."

In the first few photos, she's happy and smiling and young . Standing with a wide smile on her face next to Mrs. T, red cups held aloft as they toasted the camera. His father teaching her to how to perfect her swing as she laughs, prom, graduation, a wedding picture with Elvis as the minister, Sitting on the couch holding a baby Billy, . And he was pretty sure that in this one, it's him she's holding, smiling with tiredness at the edges of her eyes. He thinks he might sit there for hours staring at the photo until he sees her hand writing on a pink envelope. He knows its her handwriting because he remembers the loopy girlish look of it when she would stick a candy bar his backpack with those brightly colored sticky notes attached: "Have a good day, Timmy! I love you .". He gently picks them up. Opening one, he begins to read by the green glow of the dashboard lighting.

"Tee, married life is pretty nice. At least Daddy's not jumping down my throat for little things and Walt is always happy too see me at the end of every day. How's Sarah Lawerence? You're thinking about transferring to be near Eric? That's all very sweet and romantic but just make sure it is you really want. Sarah Lawerence was your dream and I have a sneaking suspicion that Eric will wait as long as you need. I met this girl Angela, working at Fran's. She's real sweet but I miss you. Keep me posted. Love you! Hannah."

He reads them all out loud with Julie leaning as close to him as her tiny car will allow. He learns of the Taylors' engagement and Billy' 's birth, then the Taylors' marriage. He stops at the mention of his name.

"Timothy was born today and its snowing, which, as you know, is really rare for Texas., I wonder if it says something about my boy. I think He's going to be my deep thinker, Tee, he's so alert and watchful, it's funny. Timothy means 'to honor God' and I thought it fit him. He looks like me my cheekbones and everything,. Well not everything, Ha! I know you want a baby so badly -just hang on girl, I know God has a good things for you. Just wait him out. I love you just like always, Hannah."

He sucked in a breath.

"Tim?"

"I'm okay." He exhales and continues reading.

"Tee, I'm so very glad to hear that all our prayers have been answered and you are expecting. As for Eric's opinion of the name Julie, ignore him and name her if it is in fact a her whatever you want. He doesn't have to give birth to it that alone gives you naming dibs if you ask me. Besides, I like the name Julie its simple and classic. My boys are growing like weeds, and some loud weeds they are. I love you! Call me… -Hannah."

Tim recognized the date on the next one and his heart froze, his breath trapped in his lungs.

"What, babe?" Julie asked.

"The mail date, it's… it's three days after she told us."

"Oh," was her quiet answer.

After a deep breath, Julie asked. "Do want to skip it?"

"No, would you read it?"

Silence envelops the car for a second, that pretty bottom lip he loves so much trapped between her teeth.

Their fingers brush and his hand trembles ever so slightly as he passes the letter too her.

Her voice is steady and it helps him level out.

"Tee, there is no easy way to say what I have to tell you. Which is, I think, why I'm writing it down instead. I can't handle any more sadness and I know I'll be able to hear the tears in your voice. I have ovarian cancer. The boys know. Tim had tons of questions and Billy got all sullen but later cried himself to sleep. I don't know how to make this okay for them when I can't do it for myself. Walt isn't handling it well. He goes from angry to sad and back to angry all within minutes. We are all dealing the best we can. I guess., How are you and your crew doing? How's baby girl doing? Call me once everything sinks in. love you! As always, Hannah."

"Either mom cried when she read it or Hannah cried as she wrote it. T here are tears splattering the ink."

"Hm," Tim muses because he really has no words. The silence is surprisingly comfortable. He loves that he can just be with Julie. No pressure to say or do anything.

-/-

He's not sure why Julie had beckoned him here before the ass crack of dawn but still, he's here. She's leaning on her car, parked in front of the 'for sale' sign on what would have been his land.

"Come on, handsome, help me jump the fence."

"Why are we here?"

"Boost now ask later, beautiful."

He smirks and basically dumps her over the fence before following. They are walking along when she finally speaks.

"Do you love me?"

He notices the sky is beginning to pinken as he realizes he's never told her that he does indeed love her. "Yes, Julie, I love you very much."

"I love you, Tim and I don't want this…us thing to end. I know you don't have much use for commitments or future plans but…,"

"Julie, you are in my life to stay you know that don't you?"

She smiles up at him. " I do now."

"Good, now why are we here again?"

"Do you want to stay in Dillon? Here on this land? bBecause I have a way."

"How?"

"When I turn twenty-one I get access to a trust fund set up for me by my grandmother. I have enough for half and if we work all this year, we should be able to manage the other half. And if we put the land in my name, it won't violate your probation."

He catches her by surprise, kissing her.

"But why would you do that?"

"Because I love you and I can."

-/-

A week later, …

Tim is picking the daisies growing wild around the tree he is leaning against. He looks up from the daisy chain he is making to see Julie marking off an area in the dirt.

"What are you doin'?"

"This is where my claw foot tub is going to go."

"Baby, that would mean an oak tree would join you in the bubble bath."

"So we move it over a few inches., Who taught you that?"

"My mom.," He stands, finishing the chain as he walks and places the daisy crown on her head. "Got room in there for me?"

"Mm hm.,"

he steps over the imaginary tub line and sits behind her.

"So I thought the kitchen should face all those hills. I like the view."

"Anything else?" Tim smirks.

"She grins "Oooh, Windows. Lots of them. I like the light."

"Okay, and I was thinking ranch- style, all one level so Jay can get around."

"Works for me." They hear a horn honk, drawing their attention to what would one day be the front of their property.

"I wanted to show your dad, get another opinon on building plans-you don't mind do you?"

"Not at all!"

Tim gets up and runs to open the gate for Eric.

Julie comes over and hugs her father as Tim rambles about floor plans.

"Didn't you leave your bath water running, babe?"

"Oh yeah.," She runs over and plays like she's turning things off. Eric laughs.

He remembers when he and Tami were young and naieve and even simple dreaming could make their day. He is glad Julie has that.

Tim feels Julie hug him from behind and thinks to himself that maybe the magic is returning slowly.

-/-

During Julie's last year of college, they spent more money flying to see one another than they saved but now three years later they are building their place with their own two hands and living in the Air stream he'd bought off Becky's mom for a hundred bucks. It's a tight fit, but he's never been happier.

He's stopped putting up dry wall long enough for a beer. He stomps into the trailer and stands over the sink, looking out at the setting sun as he pops the cap.

Glancing down, he saw sees the note Julie had left him.

"Went to Mom and Dad's to shower, love ya, Jules."

He smiles and looks back up and there, on the left of the sink, is another snow globe sitting next to his mom's.

"How'd I miss that?"

He picks it up for closer inspection. Inside is what appeared to be a sonogram picture- at least that is what he thought it was, Mindy put hers on the fridge when she was preg…

Running outside to the truck, he sat the snow globe in the passenger seat, even taking the time to buckle it in as if it was a small child and not an inanimate object.

He raced over to the Taylors', busting in unannounced.

"Julie, Jules! Where are you?" he shouted.

"Hi there, Tim,." Tami said from the kitchen.

"Hi, Mrs Coach…" He sounded a little breathless even to his own ears

"I'm in the tub, Tim,." She shouted back. He could practically hear her smiling.

He rushed in to the bathroom, where she lounged back into sudsy water.

"Hi, Timmy."

"Hi. Are you, does this mean what I think it does?"

"Yes, I'm pregnant, Tim."

He laughed like a giddy little boy and it made her smile. He stepped over into the tub. "Tim, what are you doing?"

"Getting in the tub." He bent down, taking her face in his hands as he kissed her.

"But you still have clothes on —you're adding dry wall to my bath salts."

He laughed. "I love you."

"Love you too."

A few minutes later, he lay in the tub leaning back against her.

"If it's a girl, I'd like to name her Hannah."

"Okay."

Eric walked by. peering in. "What are ya'll doin?"

"Bathing,." Julie replied.

"Get out of there Tim its not…she's naked …"

"Hey, Coach, we're having a baby . Not like right now but-" Tim smiled wildly. As Eric's jaw dropped Tim felt Julie's rumbling laugh against his back a moment before he heard it.

-/-

Ten years ago, Tim was just getting out of prison. Now he's sitting in the home office with nothing but the sun filtering through the mini- blinds and the swishing metallic noise of the fan for company as he does the pay roll for his company.

Julie's at some women's run- walk for cancer with Ttami, his six year-old, Hannah, is down for a nap and he really doesn't feel much like working so he rips off a sheet of notebook paper from a spiral Julie keeps handy, wads it up and shoots it at the basket ball hoop hanging from the door. He misses and shoots a few more baskets.

Around twenty minutes pass before he hears Hannah playing in her room, talking to someone. He knows she has imaginary friends and it always makes him smile. He hears her feet making their stomp down the hall since she she's slightly pigeon toed it makes for a unique sound. Her dark head pops around the door frame.

"Hi Daddy,"

"Hey Hannie." He smiles as she bounces toward him in his lime green Big Merri's BBQ t-shirt, one purple sock, one red, a pink tiara on her head Maybe he shouldn't have let her dress herself today.

She climbs up into his lap, bony knees digging into his stomach.

"What ya doin', Daddy?"

"Procrastinating . You?"

"What does that word mean?"

Licking his thumb, he wipes some ketchup from the corner of her mouth left over from the Alamo Freeze burger he'd let her have for lunch. Her nose wrinkles, looking so much like Julie that he can't stop the laugh that bubbles up from erupting. And that seems to tick her off.

" I don't like spit baths!" she says.

He kisses her forehead, fighting the urge to chuckle again. "Sorry I forgot. Procrastinating means you are putting of something because you don't want to do it."

"So, I do that procrastinating thing at bed time."

He grins. "Somethin' like that. Darlin', what were you and Bob in there talking about?"

"That wasn't Bob, that was me and same name."

"Same name?" his brows furrowed this was new.

"We have the same name, 'cept her's is Hannah Grace and I'm Hannah Tamara."

Goosebumps popped along his forearms "What did guys talk about?"

"I said I like your snow globe, the one your mama gave you, and she said you should give it to me since you have your own magic now and don't need it no more."

"Anymore…" Tim corrected her.

-/-

He stands behind Julie in Hannah's bedroom doorway.

He watches as Julie's head cocks to the side when she spots the globe on the shelf over Hannah's bed. He'd given her the toy because whether or not it was actually his mother's spirit his daughter talked to or if it was just Hannie's entirely too- smart way of getting what she wanted, . It s still true that he has his own magic now. Even though it's more subtle than gaining a touch down, it's no less powerful. When Julie said she'd marry him, when he scares away the monsters residing under his child's bed. He lives for the noise and the silence now, he lives for the magic and hard won realism. He doesn't need symbolism when everything that matters is laid before him in moments like now.

"She wanted it so I let her have it." He answers Julie's silent question.


End file.
